


delights not me

by consumptive_sphinx



Category: Temeraire - Naomi Novik
Genre: Asexuality, Idiots Talk About Feelings, M/M, Self-Acceptance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-07
Updated: 2017-01-07
Packaged: 2018-09-15 10:59:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,188
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9231914
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/consumptive_sphinx/pseuds/consumptive_sphinx
Summary: Laurence does not need, want, or particularly enjoy physical intimacy of any sort, and has very little idea as to why.Tharkay, meanwhile, finds himself growing increasingly frustrated as time goes on.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [BlueJayDragon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlueJayDragon/gifts).



> warning for sex-repulsed character forcing himself to have sex, with about the results that one might expect

Tharkay finds that he is growing more and more frustrated as time goes on. 

He has a line that he very seldom crosses, in his propositions; he prides himself on subtlety in this as much as in everything else he does. But since the incident in the sewers, for the first time since Sara Madden, Tharkay finds himself repeatedly crossing that line.

It wouldn’t be so bad if Laurence would respond favourably, or even if Laurence would respond at all. Tharkay has tried everything he can think of — he bats his eyelashes when Laurence is speaking, lets his hips sway when he knows Laurence is looking at him, sucks on the tips of his fingers while staring Laurence directly in the eyes — and although the other aviators are visibly tiptoeing around the subject, Laurence doesn’t even seem to _notice._

It’s infuriating, is what it is. If Sara were here, Tharkay would rant about it to her: but then again, if Sara were here, more than likely Tharkay wouldn’t have this problem in the first place. 

It’s not as though he can talk about it to anybody else, Tharkay thinks, and then as if for the express purpose of proving him wrong, Granby sits down on the ground next to him. “You’ve been staring at Laurence’s arse for the last four minutes,” he says, as cheerfully as if it meant nothing at all. 

This time, for once, it’s an honest mistake. Tharkay elects not to say so, just continuing to stare into space — not at Laurence’s arse this time, he makes sure of that. 

That doesn’t seem to turn Granby away. “It isn’t going to work with him, you know,” he says. “What you’ve been doing, I mean.” 

That gets Tharkay’s attention: everybody _knows_ about his flirtations with Laurence, but Granby is the first so far to say so openly. “What do you mean?” he asks, keeping his voice as flat as possible. 

Granby smiles, a little bit self-deprecating. “He just won’t notice, it doesn’t matter what you do. I’ve tried,” and that’s a bit surprising but only a bit, and then, “He isn’t nearly so uptight if you stop,” and he says this as if it’s a great secret. Tharkay supposes that perhaps it is. 

“Isn’t he.” Imagining a non-uptight Laurence is a bit like imagining a camel in a townhouse. 

Granby nods, then reaches out to squeeze Tharkay’s shoulder. Tharkay doesn’t mind nearly as much as he should. “Best of luck,” he says, and stands and walks off again. 

Yes. Best of luck. Tharkay has never had an abundance of luck, but he supposes he’ll probably need it. 

 

 

Laurence pushes aside the discomfort in his gut when he enters the girl’s room. _It’s just sex,_ says the part of his mind that speaks in Tom Riley’s voice, and he tries to listen to it. People do this all the time and enjoy it.

The girl — Erica? — closes the door behind them and starts unbuttoning Laurence’s clothes. Laurence lets her. His hands are shaking too hard to reciprocate, so he doesn’t. She kisses him with her mouth open and probes at the inside of his mouth with her tongue. It tastes sour like the aftertaste of wine. He probes back, a little bit, and she seems to enjoy it. _People enjoy this,_ Laurence repeats to himself.

She gets his coat off and his shirt open, leaving them crumpled on the floor. Laurence feels like he probably shouldn’t pause to pick them up, so he follows her to the bed, where he stands stiffly while she strips her clothes off. She presses him down to the mattress. He doesn’t push back. 

Her hands still at his trousers. “Let’s get these off,” she says, in the same tone of voice that some of Laurence’s shipmates use when they think that he’s being stuffy. He lifts his hips off the bed to make it easier. 

The girl kneels across Laurence's hips, sinking down onto him. She moans faintly. Laurence imitates the sound as best as he can, and she seems to like that so he does it again, but after a few moments she closes her eyes and he allows his mind to wander. His mind seems to have left his body; it feels as if he were floating slightly above himself, which is much more pleasant than what the girl is doing, so he allows it to continue.

When the girl is done Laurence thanks her, puts his clothes back on as quickly as he is able, and leaves. His skin feels oddly tight around him; he does not throw up afterwards, but it’s far from a certain thing. 

_People enjoy that,_ Laurence reminds himself again, but here is the problem: he doesn't have any idea of _why._

 

 

Tharkay finds that he is growing more and more frustrated as time goes on. 

He’d made his peace with the fact that Laurence had no trace of inversion in him whatsoever (and thus with his own lack of prospects), and Granby’s company is an exceedingly effective relief for the _other_ sort of frustration, but that makes it no less aggravating to watch as - well. As oblivious as Laurence had seemed to be to Tharkay’s own flirtations, that had at least been explicable. 

That he is, apparently, just as blind to the advances of the various women of New South Wales is not. 

After watching the fourth young woman so far endeavour to have circumstances remove her of her clothing, only for Laurence to comment on her extremely poor luck and offer her his coat, Tharkay waits only for himself and Granby to step out of the room and out of earshot before turning to Granby and saying, “Do you ever think that perhaps he is merely _stupid?”_

Granby laughs, not unkindly. “I have never known him to be this unobservant about anything else,” he says, and leans closer into Tharkay’s side before admitting, “but I am fairly certain that for all his years, our Laurence remains entirely chaste.” 

Tharkay does not miss the possessive, but neither does he comment on it. Laurence has caught up with them, his coat back on his shoulders and his expression thoroughly befuddled, and even Tharkay is not so rough in his manners as to discuss another man’s virginity in front of him. 

It still doesn’t quite explain just how blind Laurence seems to be - but Granby is smiling, and Laurence is smiling as well, and Tharkay finds that he can put the matter out of his mind.

 

 

Laurence brings a deck of cards when he goes to Roland’s rooms. 

She seems amused by that, and he isn’t certain of why. That was what she had invited him to do: play cards. He doesn’t bring it up, however - it often seems as if there were a joke that everybody in the world excepting Laurence was in on, or a colour that only he could not see, and he has long since learned that asking about it would get him nowhere.

“I’m going to change into something more comfortable,” she says, and then, a little bit teasing, “I trust you to shuffle fairly.” 

Laurence is halfway through dealing the cards when Roland returns, wrapped in a dressing robe. She blinks at him as if he were doing something very strange, before sitting down in a position that cannot possibly be comfortable — which seems like it would defeat the purpose of the dressing robe, but Laurence supposes that if Roland minds then she’ll move — and gives Laurence a flash of a half smile over her cards. He smiles back. 

Roland is an excellent card player, even if she is acting somewhat oddly; she keeps contorting her spine and blinking very rapidly for no particular reason. Eventually, Laurence has to ask, “I’m sorry, do you have something in your eye?” 

She stopped blinking abruptly. “...Laurence,” she said, very slowly, “I’ve been propositioning you for the last half an hour.”

That makes certain things more clear, Laurence thinks, and then he notices absentmindedly that his hands are shaking. “Oh,” he says, because it is all that he can think to. 

There’s a long silence where the two of them stare at one another and do little else. 

“I — I should go.” Laurence knows full well that he sounds like an idiot, but what else could he say?

Roland frowns. “Why?” 

As if that isn’t obvious, Laurence thinks, but he only says, “I would really prefer not to—” and cuts himself off before he can say the words out loud. 

“Sleep with me?” 

Laurence could answer that it’s more than that, that there is a reason his muscles have been tense and his stance defensive the whole night and now he knows what that reason was, but honestly — honestly, he doesn’t want to have this discussion, he doesn’t want to explain (to his commanding officer, no less) the full extent of what is missing from him, and so he does not. He stands up and collects his cards and he leaves. 

Roland doesn’t invite him to her rooms again, and Laurence cannot help but be grateful: but that being said, he sometimes finds himself missing the friendship they could have had. 

 

 

Tharkay leans heavily against Granby and allows himself to be tired. His hands still ache, even after what the doctors could manage, but he’d refused to let the others see that weakness. Granby he can trust. 

“Laurence knows, by the way,” Granby says after a moment. 

Tharkay doesn’t stiffen, but only out of practice. “About us?” 

“About me. I had to tell him, they were going to marry me off to the —” and here Granby shudders, the movement more obvious than usual where he’s pressed against Tharkay. “Anyway.” 

“What did he say?” Tharkay can’t imagine that Laurence, of all people, had said anything too awful, but he does know how dangerous it can be for men like Granby and himself. 

Granby opens his mouth, then closes it again. He waits long enough to speak that Tharkay starts to revise that thought, and then — “At first, he was confused that I couldn’t go back and forth, as it were.” He takes a deep breath. “Once I explained, though — he said that he understood, and that of course we would find a way out of the marriage, and that it should have been my choice to tell him but that he was glad to know, and that he would take my secret to the grave if it came to that.” 

Tharkay blinks. Even from Laurence, he would never have expected _that._

“I think I might be in love with him,” he says, almost — but not quite — without thinking. 

There’s a moment of silence, but when Tharkay turns to look at Granby’s expression, he isn’t surprised but incredulous. “And you’re only _just_ noticing this?”

Tharkay is affronted at that for all of two seconds, before he thinks back and realizes that he _did_ follow the man around the world. “No, of course not,” he says, “but if he meant what he said to you—” 

_I might actually have a chance,_ Tharkay doesn’t finish, but both he and Granby know what he would have said. 

 

 

It isn’t until they are in Russia that Laurence talks about it with anybody, but he would be content even if he never spoke of it at all. 

Temeraire had attributed Laurence’s high spirits to the return of his memories, or perhaps to having Tharkay back, and while this is not _incorrect_ — seeing Tharkay again had made Laurence’s heart swell in ways that he could not quite account for — it is not the only reason. It may not even be the primary reason, although Laurence refrains from discussing this with his twenty-ton dragon until he is a bit more certain of it himself. 

But Tharkay asks, one night when they’re pressed close for warmth in the tent they’re sharing, why Laurence seems so much happier than he had before, and Laurence cannot answer anything but truthfully. 

“I spoke with Granby, when we were in Brazil.”

“He told me,” Tharkay says. “And him being an invert doesn’t seem like it would make you this happy, unless,” and he doesn’t finish the sentence. 

Laurence rushes to correct the assumption. “It isn’t that, really,” he says, and pauses to put his thoughts into words. “But the way that I had always understood things to be was that — was that inverts could _switch,”_ and he trusts that Tharkay will know what he means, “but all men liked women, on some level. And that isn’t true, and that means that —” he swallows hard, “—that there is _nothing wrong with me.”_

It’s the first time that Laurence has said it out loud to anybody, and the freedom of it feels like the joy of flying. 

And the way that Tharkay’s widen, his lips curl into an artless smile — that could be like flying too, Laurence thinks, and he pulls the man closer into his arms. 

Laurence does not kiss him, not just yet, but he knows that he could, and that's as good as he needs.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [no, nor woman neither](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10869711) by [consumptive_sphinx](https://archiveofourown.org/users/consumptive_sphinx/pseuds/consumptive_sphinx)




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